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What examples of digging through that amount of ice for the purposes of mining are you familiar with? What's a good example? It'd be interesting to understand

What examples of digging through that amount of ice for the purposes of mining are you familiar with? What's a good example? It'd be interesting to understand how much the environment there increases the cost of mining. Anything is possible, but it'd be cool to know whether it makes any sense. (and yes, I think our leadership in the US is fully capable of causing an international crisis over mineral assets that would in financial terms be best left in the ground)

AlotOfReading 9mo ago
It's not for mining, but the US built Camp Century and Camp TUTO in the ice to determine how feasible Project Iceworm would be. A construction film about the former was declassified some decades ago [0]. Icefield construction wasn't feasible even in the context of cold-war era MAD spending. Actual subglacial mining has only been attempted a few times. Kumtor gold mine in Kyrgyzstan is in the middle of a couple glaciers and reshaped the landscape to redirect the glaciers a bit. Svea Nord in Svalbard ran tunnels under a glacier for coal. Canada's Granduc mine wasn't technically on or under a glacier, but it was just below one. [0] https://archive.org/details/TheU.S.ArmysTopSecretArcticCityUnderTheIceCampCenturyRestoredClassifiedFilm https://archive.org/details/TheU.S.ArmysTopSecretArcticCityU...
- justin66 9mo ago
  I guess I don't even know what to do with some of this information. It occurred to me that you'd also probably have to build some infrastructure (power plant, railroad, fuel terminal, a real port... I don't know) in order to even get the ball rolling. I don't think anyone's going to pay for that by taxing the citizens of Nuuk. I also wonder if there has ever been a real geopolitical obstacle to doing this stuff, since the Danes and Greenlanders seem amenable to doing business. It would seem the obstacles have all been financial.
  - AlotOfReading 9mo ago
    As I said in a comment elsewhere, arctic mining is doable with nation-state level resources. There's just no reason to do so that isn't better accomplished by other means. It would be stupid, expensive, and devastate a beautiful country. As for "amenable", my experience is that people in the arctic are relatively unhappy about that sort of industrial development. They like the places they live.

AlotOfReading 9mo ago

It's not for mining, but the US built Camp Century and Camp TUTO in the ice to determine how feasible Project Iceworm would be. A construction film about the former was declassified some decades ago [0]. Icefield construction wasn't feasible even in the context of cold-war era MAD spending. Actual subglacial mining has only been attempted a few times. Kumtor gold mine in Kyrgyzstan is in the middle of a couple glaciers and reshaped the landscape to redirect the glaciers a bit. Svea Nord in Svalbard ran tunnels under a glacier for coal. Canada's Granduc mine wasn't technically on or under a glacier, but it was just below one. [0] https://archive.org/details/TheU.S.ArmysTopSecretArcticCityUnderTheIceCampCenturyRestoredClassifiedFilm https://archive.org/details/TheU.S.ArmysTopSecretArcticCityU...

justin66 9mo ago
I guess I don't even know what to do with some of this information. It occurred to me that you'd also probably have to build some infrastructure (power plant, railroad, fuel terminal, a real port... I don't know) in order to even get the ball rolling. I don't think anyone's going to pay for that by taxing the citizens of Nuuk. I also wonder if there has ever been a real geopolitical obstacle to doing this stuff, since the Danes and Greenlanders seem amenable to doing business. It would seem the obstacles have all been financial.
- AlotOfReading 9mo ago
  As I said in a comment elsewhere, arctic mining is doable with nation-state level resources. There's just no reason to do so that isn't better accomplished by other means. It would be stupid, expensive, and devastate a beautiful country. As for "amenable", my experience is that people in the arctic are relatively unhappy about that sort of industrial development. They like the places they live.